HL Deb 17 November 1970 vol 312 cc1097-113

11.31 p.m.

LORD ALPORT rose to ask Her Majesty's Government:

Whether, since any settlement with the Rhodesian Front Régime must accord with the Five Principles and in view of the attitude to these Principles set out in recent public statements by Mr. Ian Smith indicating that they are unacceptable, they have any proposals with regard to the implementation of the sanctions policy during the indefinite period ahead during which sanctions must consequently be maintained.

The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question in my name on the Order Paper. I hope that if I do so at somewhat greater length than would be perhaps normal in the circumstances, your Lordships will extend me your indulgence. I should like to say, if I may, how much I regret adding to the burdens of my noble friend the Leader of the House, who has kindly undertaken to be here and to reply to this small debate. I had not realised that the Minister of State was away; otherwise this debate might have taken place at a different time.

I raise this Question at this late hour, at the end of an important day's debate, because, as I am sure my noble friend the Leader of the House is aware, there are some unhealthy rumours circulating at the present time in this country and no doubt in Rhodesia as well. As a distinguished individual put it to me a few days ago, there is the sour smell in the air of a deal between Her Majesty's Government and the Rhodesian Front régime involving the effective abandonment of the Five Principles in return for some meaningless political formula of intent by Mr. Smith, the gradual emasculation of sanctions and the eventual acceptance of the political situation in Rhodesia, first de facto, and later de jure, on the assumption that this will restore British trade and commerce with that country. I am sure in my own mind—and I know that noble Lords on both sides will agree—that, with Sir Alec Douglas-Home at the Foreign Office, and my noble friend Lord Lothian as his Minister of State in charge of Africa, such a betrayal of the reputation of Britain and the Government's good faith is unthinkable. Nevertheless, there are people, including perhaps Mr. Smith himself, who have been encouraged to think precisely on these lines, and the sooner they are disabused the better.

I recognise that, in accordance with their Election pledges, the Government are bound to have at least one more try at achieving a negotiated political settlement. I understand that the preliminary moves are now being made. Lord Lothian said in his speech last week that Sir Arthur Snelling in Pretoria is speaking for Her Majesty's Government and Air Vice-Marshal Hawkins is his contact. I can think of no two individuals more likely to conduct talks about talks with greater integrity and good humour. But I hope that these negotiations will not be allowed to proceed to any extent veiled in conditions of secrecy, because in these circumstances there is great danger in the reactions both in Rhodesia itself and here if public opinion is not kept fully informed about the developments that take place.

My Lords, it is my personal view that the Government would have been better advised to have delayed the start of any negotiations of a political nature for twelve months or more, in order to give them a better chance of success. I am personally sure that the gap is still too wide for political bridge-building. If I am wrong, and the Government negotiate an agreement which can be accepted with honour and conviction by Parliament and by the people of the United Kingdom, no one will be happier to be proved wrong than I.

I feel sure that my noble friend the Leader of the House, in replying to this short debate, will re-affirm that it is the policy of Her Majesty's Government to adhere strictly to the Five Principles in spirit as well as in letter, and that any soi-disant spokesman of the Conservative Party who has given the impression here or in Salisbury that Her Majesty's Government are prepared to accept Mr. Smith's solution of the Rhodesian problem has no authority and must be repudiated, and that in the absence of an acceptable solution from the point of view of Her Majesty's Government sanctions will continue.

The last time I spoke in favour of Her Majesty's Government's sanctions policy was almost exactly five weeks ago, when I addressed a large overflow meeting in a hall about 150 yards from Mr. Smith's office in Salisbury, Rhodesia. Before doing so, I had the chance of meeting and talking to representatives from a wide spectrum of political opinion, African as well as European, stretching from the Left to the extreme Right. I was able to get some idea of the effect of sanctions on the Rhodesian economy. I tried to assess that impact in political as well as economic terms. There is no doubt, my Lords, that sanctions have had a profound effect upon the Rhodesian economy and that below the surface economic tension is mounting. Most Europeans in Rhodesia do not realise that the healthiness of their economy is not being measured by the quantity of consumer goods in the shops, or the elaborate menus in the hotel dining rooms, or the ready availability of petrol for their motorcars, or the number of attractive bungalows being built in the European suburbs of Highlands and Borodaile.

Until 1965 the economy of Rhodesia was based primarily on agriculture—European and African. Sanctions have gravely damaged the whole agricultural industry on which the country depended for its most important exports and for maintaining a reasonable standard of living for its increasing African population. That population has grown during the last 10 years from 4 million to 5 million. The switch, which sanctions has brought about, from agriculture to light consumer industry and mining, has created the need for substantial capital investment in buildings, imported machinery and transport facilities. In the short term the creation of an import substitute consumer industry has been very successful, but it has masked the reality of sanctions. Foreign exchange resources have been either frozen or are exhausted, and Rhodesia is living from hand to mouth, depending on what she can sell through devious channels. And such foreign exchange as she can obtain is increasingly needed to maintain her existing transport system and service existing industrial installations. For instance, my Lords, three months or so ago all available rolling stock had to be concentrated to move priority exports to the coast. Some said that it was tobacco, others that it was chrome for the United States or for Russia or China—but the result was that the whole Rhodesian railway system was disrupted for a considerable period of time.

Rhodesia requires capital urgently for transport, for mining machinery; its budget is heavily encumbered by defence expenditure; its agriculture is unable to contribute to its foreign exchange resources; equipment is wearing out in its factories, and the latter cannot expand in a way which will enable Rhodesia to meet the employment and social needs of its exploding African population.

I have no doubt that with some continued help from South Africa and Portugal, by an even more ingenious policy for evading sanctions, a couple of good agricultural seasons and the continued refusal of the European population to face the realities, the present Rhodesian Government will be able to carry on for a period of time. But it can only do so at the cost of seeing its economy gradually slowed down and eventually become involved in a financial crisis. When I was in Rhodesia in 1967, I was told that it was estimated that the Rhodesian pound was worth 8s. to 11s. To-day, the Rhodesian dollar, which is normally the equivalent of our 10s., and which claims a better exchange rate against the U.S. dollar than the pound sterling, must be worth a good deal less than 5s. What chance is there of Rhodesia, which is desperately short of foreign exchange for essential re-equipment and development, meeting its overseas liabilities without massive outside help, and where is that help to come from?

I have studied the statement of Mr. Wrathall, the Minister of the Treasury in Rhodesia, of November 8, and I find nothing in it to alter the view expressed to me in South Africa and Rhodesia that the foreign exchange situation was becoming so grave that Rhodesia must in time face an eventual day of reckoning in the shape of a financial breakdown. Rhodesian Ministers to-day are caught in a fearful dilemma. They dare not admit the seriousness of the financial situation in case they sap European morale, yet until they do admit it hard line Europeans will not be prepared to accept a settlement with Britain or allow Mr. Smith to do so. Thus they are doomed to go on to the bitter end.

I referred earlier to the great growth of the African population from 4 million to 5 million in ten years. In the same period, the European population has increased by only 19,000, and of the 218,000 of Europeans there in 1960, 82,000 have left the country and 74,000 immigrants have arrived.

LORD FERRIER

My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord? When he says that the population has increased from 4 million to 5 million, can he say how many of that 1 million are indigenous Rhodesian Africans and how many Africans from Nyasaland?

LORD ALPORT

My Lords, this is an increase of Rhodesian Africans, so far as I know from the figures; there are 5,010,000 in Rhodesia at the present time. The present Government has reduced some of its problem of African unemployment by refusing to allow Portuguese East Africans and Malawi Africans who returned home to come back to Rhodesia for employment. It is difficult to get the exact increase, but the problem they face at the moment is dealing with an African population which, according to their statistics, is 5,010,000 in 1970.

LORD FERRIER

Nevertheless, of that 5 million, the noble Lord will agree, a number are from Malawi?

LORD ALPORT

So far as I know, but it is not made clear from the statistics. Of the Europeans, 74,000 are immigrants who have come into Rhodesia in the last ten years, and many of the Europeans there today would get out of Rhodesia if they could repatriate their funds or could get passports; and many more would go if Rhodesian Ministers told them the truth. The mistakes which Mr. Smith and his colleagues in Rhodesia have made are to believe, first, that they could rely on U.D.I, being a seven-day wonder; secondly, that the ready ability of a beleaguered community to defend itself against economic attack in the short term could enable them to withstand the effects of long-term sanctions; and, thirdly, that the supremacy of a racial minority in Africa today can be maintained indefinitely.

It is because I do not think that the Rhodesian leaders or public opinion realise the extent of the misjudgment which has taken place that I do not think the time has yet come to enter into negotiations for a political settlement, and why I feel sure that if there are negotiations those negotiations are bound to fail. It follows, therefore, that in renewing sanctions for a further period we should examine the effect which these will have on all the people of Rhodesia. After all, the object of sanctions is to coerce those who hold power in Rhodesia today, and not to inflict hardship on those who have no power to alter Rhodesian Front policies or who have opposed those policies right from the start.

I shall offer certain views in a moment with regard to the Europeans. But for the present I am concerned with the position of the Africans in Rhodesia. The number I have already said: 5,010,000. When I was in Salisbury I met and talked with representatives of all the Rhodesian political Parties, those that claim to represent the Chiefs and people; the multi-racial groups; the successors of Zanu and Zapu, with leading African clergy and with ordinary Africans from the native purchase areas. It is the Africans who have been hardest hit by sanctions, and it is also for the Africans that the policy and philosophy of the Rhodesian Front is creating the greatest discrimination. By 1975 there will be 5½ million Africans in Rhodesia, and if sanctions are to continue indefinitely some thought, I submit, must be given to the fact that their present application may inflict hardship on them quite disproportionate to the political results which the sanctions policy can be expected to achieve.

As many of your Lordships know, the basis of social security for the African is the right of recourse to the tribal lands. For those who have moved out of the primitive economy of the tribe the native purchase areas provide independence and relative affluence. Both depend for their prosperity and development on investment by means of grant or loan. Some years ago a group of far-sighted Rhodesian Europeans, led by Mr. Colin Kirkpatrick, set up an African loan and development company to act as a sort of agricultural and industrial investment bank for Africans. It has recently been reorganised as a trust, and is directed by men in whose integrity and judgment Her Majesty's Government could have complete confidence. Although its activities at the present moment are confined to the native purchase areas, I am assured that it could extend its work to the tribal trust areas through independent co-operatives. While the Labour Government was in power £50,000 was transmitted by OXFAM to this organisation. If sanctions are to continue, I suggest that financial support should be made available to this trust by Her Majesty's Government on conditions to be negotiated with the Smith régime.

The economy of rural African Rhodesia is one problem; another is African education. All the Africans I spoke to confirmed my impression that standards were falling. Africans themselves do not have confidence in the ability of the ill-educated African local committees to support a tolerable system of African education. There is widespread suspicion that it is the deliberate policy of the present régime to depress African educational levels in order to prevent the African from attaining the standard of educational and economic advancement necessary to achieve the degree of political influence which even the 1969 Constitution holds out for him. My Lords, since 1965 large sums of money have been made available for African education through the missionary societies. Much more is now needed. I suggest that these societies should be the channel through which financial help for African education should be given; and that the forthcoming negotiations should be employed to decide how this should be done.

But many people in Rhodesia will say: "If you develop the African tribal trust and native purchase areas and still keep strict sanctions, we shall be prevented from exporting the surplus tobacco and maize which these tribal lands will produce." Much of their production would be consumed internally. I can record that for the first time I was accosted in Salisbury by a beggar, who said simply,"I am hungry"—and hunger is increasingly a possibility for Rhodesia's Africans.

I should be prepared to remove sanctions from exports of tobacco and other crops grown by Africans. I see no reason why sanctions should, like rain, fall on the just and the unjust, on Africans in the tribal trust areas and European supporters of the Rhodesian Front alike. Then the Rhodesians may say that if large sums of money are spent on African education it will only increase the unemployed, semi-educated African proletariat. The grievous thing is that at present many of the 74,000 Europeans who have entered Rhodesia since 1960 are artisans, who, on arrival, replace educated Africans in industry, so that the latter revert to unskilled or semi-skilled jobs. Here, again, an intelligent use of sanctions could ensure that exports which were shown to contribute to African skilled employment would be relieved of sanction.

What I am asking is if, as I believe, no early political agreement between Her Majesty's Government and Mr. Smith is possible, that the policy of sanctions should be used not only as a coercive instrument against a rebellious régime, but that it should also be employed constructively in the interests of the Africans of Rhodesia. I suggest that the extent of sanctions on African agricultural production should be decided by Her Majesty's Government in consultation with the Commonwealth Sanctions Committee. Similarly, the contribution which the relaxation of sanctions against industrial and mining production of Rhodesia can make to the entry of Africans into skilled categories of employment should be similarly assessed. Thus sanctions, instead of being a dead hand on the economic and political advancement of Africans in Rhodesia, could be converted into an instrument for speeding their economic, educational, and eventually, perhaps, their political progress, and this at any rate would give some hope—and for subject peoples hope is the most precious commodity.

No one enjoys a policy of destruction, certainly not the British people, who are heirs of a long and honourable record of political and economic power in all the Continents of the world. It would be a sad end to this record if its last chapter represented either an unconditional surrender to an arrogant and selfish minority who have indulged in an unscrupulous abuse of power, or led to a period of political and economic retardment for 5 million Africans, whom the Government have rightly regarded as the continuing responsibility of Great Britain.

I have tried to suggest a constructive approach to Her Majesty's Government in the present situation. During my tour of Africa, I was assured that at any rate the majority of those African States I visited would not be opposed to a policy designed to give practical help to the African population of Rhodesia if, at the same time, it did not compromise their ultimate political rights. I know that there are individuals in Rhodesia, in whose judgment Her Majesty's Government would have the greatest confidence, who are thinking along the same lines. I therefore ask my noble friend, when he replies, and the Government in general, to make sure that they do not allow the pressure of groups within the Government Party, or consider that the short-term interests of our finance and commerce here, or undertakings generally given by an Opposition before an election, should cause them to jettison, without examination, a policy for Rhodesia, and a basis for negotiation, which might give the chance of a constructive interlude before the eventual showdown, and which might even make that showdown avoidable.

I have spoken so far in the interests of the Rhodesian Africans, and I am not unmindful of the difficulties of the shrinking minority of liberal-minded British orientated Europeans, who have fought a losing battle against what the Prime Minister once called a Police State. I would ask on their behalf that the British Government, in matters of finance, of passports, and of communications should discriminate in their favour. I ask that if there is to be a negotiation with Mr. Smith, the British Government should insist that those who negotiate on behalf of Rhodesia should include both representatives of liberal European minorities and of the Africans; not Rhodesian Front nominees, but genuine representatives of those who believe in a multi-racial solution for the future of Africa between the Zambesi and the Limpopo.

I am grateful to your Lordships for your patience at this late hour. I want to end by saying this. Last night at the Guildhall, the Prime Minister spoke of realism and of British interests, and contrasted the formulation of policies with the striking of moral attitudes about the problems of race in Africa. I think that many of us whose lifetimes have spanned two world wars have learned at any rate one thing; that is, that political realism, British interests and moral attitudes usually coincide.

11.55 p.m.

LORD SALTOUN

My Lords, I want to ask Her Majesty's Government a very much shorter and, I hope, simpler question on this matter. I think everybody in the country is entitled to ask of this Government that they pursue reasonable objects, with a reasonable probability of their achievement. I do not ask Her Majesty's Government what their object is in this difficult situation, but whether they have a reasonable probability of achieving it. I deeply regretted it when Mr. Smith declared U.D.I., but I am bound to say that, in spite of the history dished out to the people by Her Majesty's Government, it seemed to me that he was very much in the position of the States of America 180 years ago. I can leave it at that. It is our own position that troubles me a good deal.

When this situation first arose I heard the noble and learned Lord then on the Woolsack point out to the House that in this matter the Government felt that they had responsibility but had no power, and they promptly entered into a series of hostile acts in order to acquire the power to charge them with the responsibility. To my mind that was, morally, an unjustifiable course of action. I believe it is a principle of our law that where you have no power or control you cannot be saddled with responsibility. I hope that Her Majesty's Government share that view, because I think the noble Marquess, Lord Lothian, pointed out last week that he had no responsibility for the Rhodesian police because he had no power. I could not agree more.

The situation has changed considerably since the Government of the time embarked on the course to which I have referred, because, as your Lordships will remember, the Government took the matter to the United Nations and asked them to direct activities. Now, my Lords, you do not go to the police when your children do wrong, and I think that by that act the Government tacitly conceded to Mr. Smith his independence. I think that it certainly complicates the situation for Her Majesty's Government, but I also think that the status of the United Nations in the matter is not very clear. I do not think that the institution of slavery is consistent with any portion of the United Nations Charter, but it is the case that a great many of the members of the United Nations who are most active in this matter cherish in their own countries the institution of slavery, and would be very sorry to have to discontinue it. So I do not think that Her Majesty's Government's colleagues in this matter are necessarily worthy of particular regard.

Therefore, I think that there are factors in the matter which might assist a happier outcome than I can see eventuating by insistence beforehand on a complete surrender to principles which, if everybody interprets them in the same way, are very unlikely to be accepted. I return to the original question which I asked Her Majesty's Government. Have they a definite object, which they have a reasonable hope of achieving, in entering into negotiations on this matter?

12 midnight.

EARL JELLICOE

My Lords, despite the lateness, or comparative lateness, of the hour, and the thinness, or comparative thinness, of your Lordships' House, I should like to make a few general remarks before I turn to the specific points which have been raised in this short discussion. First of all, I hope my noble friend Lord Alport will forgive me if I deal with what I may call the procedural aspect of this matter. Before doing so, I should like to extend to him and to your Lordships' House—those Members who are here—my apologies for the muddle which occurred last Tuesday, when a number of noble Lords who have an intense interest in the affairs of Southern Africa and were expecting to speak on the Rhodesian Order were not able to as a result of a quite sudden and unexpected change of business. I take full responsibility for that muddle and for the inconvenience which was caused, and I freely admit it to noble Lords.

What happened was a very simple thing. That afternoon we were debating the Reorganisation of Government—a rather dry subject. I happened to be replying to that debate; but so great was the magnetism of this, even in prospect, that over the weekend a great many noble Lords suddenly put their names down to speak, with the result that that debate went on much longer than we had anticipated when we were planning the business of your Lordships' House. That was the reason, and the only reason, why we thought, because of the importance of the Rhodesia Order and the issues which surround it, that it would be better to take it on the following day. But I apologise to those noble Lords who were inconvenienced.

My Lords, having said that I must pick a slight quarrel with my noble friend Lord Alport over the procedure which he has adopted on this occasion. First, he has raised this matter at extremely short notice. I certainly would not wish to complain for myself, but I am very acutely aware that the Question which my noble friend has put to your Lordships this evening is one in which many Members of this House have a very keen interest indeed. Apart from that aspect, my noble friend has made an extremely interesting speech. I know that he recently spent some weeks in Southern Africa, and I think it is a great pity he did not permit a fuller House the chance to listen to that speech, because he speaks with great personal and recent knowledge of Southern Africa.

The other bone I would pick with him is that he has asked this Question on an evening when it seemed very probable that the House would be sitting until a pretty late hour, as indeed we are. It is precisely because your Lordships' House is so untrammelled by restrictive practices that the noble Lord—and I repeat: I am not making any complaint—in putting this Question tonight has acted with absolute technical propriety. But the point I wish to make is this: that we manage here without many restrictive practices because, and perhaps only because, Members of your Lordships' House show a tremendous degree of restraint in these matters. If I may say so, and if my noble friend will permit me, if more Members of the House were to avail themselves so freely of the freedom which our absence of rules allows, I have a fear that we should be forced, in self-protection, to adopt rather more rigid and restrictive rules in the future, and I personally should deeply regret that.

LORD ALPORT

My Lords, may I just say to my noble friend that I fully appreciate his rebuke and I fully appreciate his earlier apology. But what is sauce for the goose is also, if I may say so, sauce for the gander. The Orders of the House were suddenly changed last week without any Notice being given, to all intents and purposes. I, at any rate, gave the Government far more notice of this Question than they gave me of the change of business on that previous occasion.

EARL JELLICOE

My Lords, I am surprised that my noble friend is revealing so clearly his motives in bringing on this debate so late this evening. I had not thought that this was his motive; but he has explained what was his real purpose in so doing. I much regret it. He made an extremely interesting speech and it would have been much better if that speech, which was full of information—

LORD ALPORT

My Lords, may I ask—

SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS

Order, order!

LORD ALPORT

My Lords, may I ask my noble friend one question? Would he have made it possible for a private Member to make an intervention in this way and to have a debate of this sort at any time within the next three weeks in Government business?

EARL JELLICOE

My Lords, I should certainly have done my utmost to have made it possible. We have our Rules, which are extremely flexible. It would certainly have been possible for my noble friend to make the interesting remarks he has made at an early date and to a fuller House. I can give him that assurance. I think it a great pity he did not take that course. But there it is. I have picked my procedural bone and should prefer to leave it like that.

May I now turn to the substance of the matter? It was made clear, both by my noble friend Lord Lothian when he introduced the Southern Rhodesia Order in this House last Wednesday, and by my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary in another place last week, that the Government intend to carry out their pledge to find out whether a realistic basis for a negotiated settlement in accordance with the Five Principles can be found. In answer to my noble friend Lord Saltoun, all I can say is that we intend to make an honest effort. I cannot say what the prospects are. I cannot say whether this effort will succeed. I hope that it will. I know that there are pessimistic voices in this respect. I cannot, in all candour, be terribly optimistic myself; but there will be an honest effort, so far as Her Majesty's Government are concerned.

In any event, in pursuance of this aim, the first step has been taken, as noble Lords are very well aware, in the shape of a preliminary message to Mr. Smith which is purely exploratory in its nature. The Government have made the purpose and method of this approach entirely clear; but I should like to add this. The House will appreciate the need to keep confidential all the exchanges at this particular stage between the Government and Mr. Smith. It really is important at this stage that these exchanges should be kept confidential. It is the Government's intention to make no statement about these exchanges unless and until there is something of substance to report to your Lordships.

My noble friend Lord Alport referred to the "sour smell"—I think those were his words—which there is about this. I must say I have not myself smelled this "sour smell", but no doubt my noble friend has. He asked whether I could do anything to dispel these rumours or to disabuse the House. I think that all I can do is to refer my noble friend to what the Foreign Secretary said on November 9 in another place about these very preliminary negotiations about negotiations, if one may so term them. These are his words: There will not be a settlement except within the five principles. Therefore, if there is a settlement, it will be within the five principles."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, 9/11/70, col. 35.] That is what my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary said. I think that my noble friend Lord Alport knows the Foreign Secretary well enough to know that when Sir Alec Douglas-Home says something like that he means it.

I think that those words are sufficient to dispel any "sour smell" that may be around. But I might also repeat the words which my noble friend Lord Lothian used in this House last week. This is what he said, in reply to some remarks made by Lord Shepherd: The noble Lord also made the point that the settlement that we hope to achieve must be watertight and that there should be no sell-out—I think he used that word. Of course, Her Majesty's Government entirely accept that position."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 11/11/70, col. 795.] Well, my Lords, if repeating those words of my noble friends helps to dispel any "sour smell" that may be around, I am glad to repeat them. That is the position, and I can give my noble friend Lord Alport a categorical assurance that it is the position.

In the meantime, as has already been made clear, sanctions are to continue; and if I understood what my noble friend said, he is in support of their maintenance in principle, if not in every particular detail. As my noble friend Lord Lothian said in your Lordships House on November 11, it must surely be right—until we know the result of our attempts to find out whether a negotiation is possible—to rule out any change in our attitude towards sanctions.

But, my Lords, what I have said applies to major modifications in our sanctions policy. I would certainly not rule out minor adjustments. The Government have already made it crystal clear that they will be ready to consider any further need for mitigation for humanitarian reasons, in addition to the action which has already been taken over the small matter of postage stamps, and the other perhaps small matter—though I thought it had a very definite humanitarian aspect—of the invalidity of certain Rhodesian divorce decrees, where this can be achieved without affecting the general structure of economic sanctions. Again I can only repeat that this is our position on this matter.

My noble friend asked certain questions about the particular application of sanctions policy to matters of finance, to passports, and indeed to travel. I should like to assure him, and I can do so straightaway, that I have carefully noted what he said and will see that it is conveyed to the proper quarters in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Meanwhile, on the question of travel facilities for young Rhodesians there is, as my noble friend will be well aware, a mandatory Security Council resolution which requires Member States to prevent the entry into their territory of persons travelling on Southern Rhodesian pass-ports. That is the United Nations position. But, that said, my Lords, we are always prepared to consider in individual cases whether there are any humanitarian grounds which would justify an exception to this requirement. Within this general principle we shall give further thought to the suggestions which my noble friend has made in this and in other areas. All I can do at this rather late hour is to say that his particular suggestions have been noted, and I will see that they are properly considered. With that I would conclude my few remarks.